Book puts you on the moon

'One Giant Leap' gives kids a feel for what it was like to walk on the moon.

July marked the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, and “One Giant Leap,” by Robert Burleigh, gives kids a feel for what it was like to be in those big boots walking on the lunar surface. Mike Wimmer’s paintings and Burleigh’s words begin “where no human has been” — en route to the moon — and proceed with poetry and scientific precision to describe the extraordinary adventure of the voyage.

The Eagle, the section of the spacecraft that contains the astronauts, “is like a gold-speckled bug falling out of the sky — its odd-shaped body plastered with many boxes, its outer walls thinner than human skin.” Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin peek out of the eerily lit windows of the Eagle at the “billion-year-old landscape.” Who knows if all the team’s calculations and engineering are correct, as these two men drop toward the surface? And finally there is touchdown, a hatch opens and a foot steps down. Philomel, $16.99. Ages 6-8.

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